Pedigree Analysis: Five Bar Cartel

Five Bars to Ed Burke fame.

By Andrea CaudillQ-Racing JournalJune 24, 2013

Five Bar Cartel. PHOTO: Scott Martinez

Five Bar Cartel was set up for success from the moment of conception, and it didn’t take long for him to fulfill his promise. On June 23, the colt took the narrowest of victories in the $1,071,000 Ed Burke Million Futurity (G1) at Los Alamitos, defeating Unchangeable by a whisker.

The Ed Burke has had a parade of superstars in its 62-year history. The race also was known as the PCQHRA Futurity (1951-1970), Pomona Quarter Horse Futurity (1968) and Pomona Futurity (1971-78), and has counted among its winners Go Man Go, Mr Bar None, Top Moon, Kaweah Bar, Town Policy, Florentine, Corona Chick, Hawkish, etc.

Five Bar Cartel’s sire Corona Cartel didn’t point at the Ed Burke during his 1996 futurity season, but he did win the Kindergarten Futurity (G2) before shipping east to The Mountain. He would return later that year to enjoy the sea air of Los Alamitos and a victory in the Los Alamitos Million Futurity (G1). Corona Cartel’s family certainly has a history of liking the Ed Burke. His dam, Corona Chick, won the 1991 edition of the race. His sisters Corona Cash (1997) and Corona Kool (1999) helped the family dominate the decade, and Corona Cartel’s son Carters Cartel won the race in 2007.

Retired late in his 3-year-old year, Corona Cartel permanently moved his address to Guthrie, Oklahoma, where he continues his stud career at Lazy E Ranch. The handsome bay stallion was raced by Celina Molina and is now owned by a syndicate, and in 13 crops has sired 1,078 starters. A full 69 percent of those returned winners, and 12 percent are stakes winners. His progeny have earnings of $41.84 million.

Corona Cartel is very closely matched in earnings with Mr Jess Perry, who has 1,032 starters who have earned $41.78 million, but in passing him this week, Corona Cartel is the leading living sire by earnings and sits second, behind only First Down Dash ($79.6 million) on the list of all-time sires by money earned. Both Corona Cartel and Mr Jess Perry surpassed Dash For Cash ($39,990,245) only recently on the list.

Dam Five Bar Molly was bred in Utah by the Barker family, who have begun nearly every one of the names of the 35 horses they have bred in the past 30 years with ‘Five Bar’. In 1984, Mary Barker partnered with Tim Clark on a yearling Timeto Thinkrich filly named Moment In Time. The mare would never race, but produced four foals. The final one, born in 1992, was Five Bar Ebony. The daughter of Streakin Dash was also unraced, but crossed to Dash Ta Fame in 1997 produced Five Bar Classy, who in her first start qualified to the Beehive Futurity, and then to the $143,846 Utah Classic Futurity (RG1). Five Bar Classy would place in three stakes, including the Utah Classic Derby (RG3) and retire with earnings of $47,863. She would produce her second foal and first stakes winner Five Bar Show Girl (by Okey Dokey Dale, $19,166) in 2007.

Five Bar Ebony’s second foal was ‘Classy’s’ full sister, Five Bar Molly, foaled in 1998. ‘Molly’, too, immediately displayed class with a third-place finish in the Du-Bar/Lee Giles/Frank Hart Futurity in her second start, and would qualify to the $150,410 Utah Classic Futurity (RG2). As a 3-year-old, she would win the Utah Classic Derby (RG3), and in September 2001 she was purchased by Esmeralda Flores. Under new ownership, she arrived at Los Alamitos and won a January 2002 allowance in her first start. After finishing second in another allowance, she vanished from the racing stage – or so it seemed.

She was bred to Strawfly Special for her first foal, a 2003 mare named Fly Bar Special. In 2007 – nearly five years to the day that she left the racing scene – she returned to racing at Los Alamitos. Now 9, the mare had spent a few years in Mexico and match raced a bit as “La Vispa”. Her owners were looking to add some money to her record to improve her catalog page, and found themselves surprised by the result. Five Bar Molly was fourth in her debut, but soon won the Miss Princess Handicap (G3) and then, two starts later, won an upset victory in the $147,200 Vessels Maturity (G1). She would close her career that year with a final record of 25-12-1-3 and earnings of $187,109.

By this point her first foal was already a stakes winner, having won the 2005 Pomona Juvenile Championship, and the mare would go on to win the 2008 California Breeders’ Matron Stakes (RG2) and retire with earnings of $110,787.

Five Bar Molly would have two foals in 2007, including the Corona Cartel filly Mollys Cartel, who was a finalist in the 2009 Ed Burke Million and Los Alamitos Two Million futurities, and earned $150,163 in her career.

Her 2010 colt by A Regal Choice, named Freedom Choice, was third in the Los Alamitos Two Million Futurity and a finalist in the Ed Burke Million Futurity and El Primero Del Ano Derby (G2), and has earned $281,423.

The 15-year-old mare has three 2-year-olds, all by Corona Cartel. Besides Five Bar Cartel, she also has Flying Housewife and Majestic Cartel, neither of which have yet started.